Everyday, thousands of people across the globe are cursing their badly managed traffic signals. But then, there has to be a solution to this. But how can the government solve this issue?
That is where Google’s Waze comes into picture. A recent report by Forbes reveals the importance of sharing the information Google acquires from the users, with the government.
The goal is traffic management, and it involves swapping data for data. More cities are lining up to get access, and while the data the apps are sharing is all anonymous for now, identifying details could get more specific if cities like what they see, and people become more comfortable with being monitored through their smartphones in return for incentives.
Here’s a city that gets the information from the users who use Waze for navigation, Moovit for public directions and Strava for tracking their biking activities.
On an average day in June, Rio’s transport planners could get an aggregated view of 110,000 drivers (half a million over the course of the month), and see nearly 60,000 incidents being reported each day – everything from built-up traffic, to hazards on the road, Waze says. Till now they’ve been relying on road cameras and other basic transport-department information.
The entire report is pretty interesting, and literally makes you think that the data that you provide to the government is worth it, since its helping them to make better traffic arrangements.
Hit the source link to read the entire report on Forbes
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